Databases play a critical role in the business operations of most organizations; they're the central repository for critical information on products, customers, suppliers, sales, and a host of other essential information. It's no wonder that the majority of all business computing involves database applications.

With so much at stake, you'd expect most IT professionals would have a firm understanding of good database design. But in fact most learn through a painful process of trial and error, with predictably poor results.

This book provides readers with proven methods and tools for designing efficient, reliable, and secure databases. Author Rod Stephens explains how a database should be organized to ensure data integrity without sacrificing performance. He shares procedures for designing robust, flexible, and secure databases that provide a solid foundation for all of your database applications. The methods and techniques in this book can be applied to any database environment, including Oracle®, Microsoft Access®, SQL Server®, and MySQL®. You'll learn the basics of good database design and ultimately discover how to design a real-world database.?

What you will learn from this book

How to identify database requirements that meet users' needs

Ways to build data models using a variety of modeling techniques, including entity-relational models, user-interface models, and semantic object models

Tips for understanding the different types of databases, including relational databases, flat files, spreadsheets, XML and object databases

How to refine and tune the design to improve database performance

Techniques for understanding the relationship between good application design and database design

Methods for designing flexible and robust databases that can adapt to business change and growth

Ways to design for ease of maintenance and support

How to avoid common database design mistakes

Who this book is for

This book is for anyone interested in learning to design, build, analyze, and understand databases. No previous experience with databases or programs is required.

Wrox Beginning guides are crafted to make learning programming languages and technologies easier than you think, providing a structured, tutorial format that will guide you through all the techniques involved.

Title:

Beginning Database Design Solutions

By:

Rod Stephens

Publisher:

Wiley / Wrox

Formats:

Ebook

Ebook:

April 2009

Pages:

400

Ebook ISBN:

978-1-4571-0413-8

| ISBN 10:

1-4571-0413-X

Rod Stephens

Rod Stephens, president of Rocky Mountain Computer Consulting, Inc., is the author of more than 20 books and 250 articles about various programming topics. Rod has been a professional developer for more than 20 years during which time he has worked on an eclectic assortment of applications in such diverse fields as telephone billing, fuel taxes, waste water treatment, and professional football. Rod’s VB Helper Web site receives roughly 200,000 visits per month and provides more than 2,000 examples demonstrating specific programming techniques in Visual Basic, while his CSharpHelper Web site contains similar examples for C# programmers. Altogether, Rod’s writing, teaching, programming, and web site experience will be invaluable in making this book far more than a “term and concept” reference—the book will also stand on its own, providing the critical background information that the other books in the series would not have sufficient room to deliver.